I took delivery of my new tower yesterday and with the help of Pete,
N4ZR, and a neighbor who owns a front loader I now have it standing
on the pad and plumbed up.

Cranking this tower (HDX 555) from horizontal to vertical was
unexpectedly very hard. The only additional weight was a 140 lb
mast snuggled inside the tower. I could only do about 10 complete
rotations and then had to take a break and I am a fairly big boy and
in fair shape.

My question is what have others done to lessen this burden? Is
there a better winch or rigging scheme to gain mechanical advantage?
My tower has two side-by-side pulleys on the tower, but only one is
used.

Both are used on my tower.

The raising fixture only has one pulley.

Mine has 2 on the fixture also.

The cable goes over the pulley at the raising fixture, around one of
the pulleys at the tower, and back to the raising fixture where it
is terminated on a bolt. We have it rigged per the instructions.

Mine goes back again to the tower through a second pulley on the
fixture, to the second pulley on the tower and then back to the
fixture terminated with a bolt, as you see. This appears to double
the mechanical advantage? Physics types could tell you.

I can crank my tower (TX-472) very easily with one hand without a
break. It comes up very slowly, but that's due to the mechanical
advantage of the pulleys. I have a Force 12-5BA (~85 pounds) and
Force 12-240/230 (~50#) and a mast of over 100# on my tower. I've
even had my wife crank the fixture just to show her how easy it was.

Perhaps they only use 1 pulley because you've got 1 less section with
a 555 vs a 472 tower? Only guessing, but I would think the extra
advantage of the second pulley would make all the difference in the
world.